Discussion (87) ¬

What goes up must come down – okay, not always, but they have to be friends before they can become enemies.

Remember, this is not a (complete) comic book universe here; Radiah is not a comic book villain who hates compulsively and grows a feminustache in order to dramatically twirl it. She’s a normal person who doesn’t even bash the mentally disabled. Which raises the question of how she could ever become the sort of person who would hate a person to maintain a campaign of harassment for months on end (or at least remember it over the summer).

The answer here is betrayal. Radiah must feel that she and Sarah were close, and that Sarah maliciously abused Radiah’s trust in destroying their little group. Believing herself to have been backstabbed, she then starts a campaign of retaliation.

The part of your comment I object to is the assumption that for this to happen, Sarah has to come out not looking good. In actual fact she merely needs to come out not looking good to Radiah. (And the rest of the clique.) This does not mean that to those of us with an inside perspective on Sarah’s motives it will look quite as bad, or even bad at all. It just means that whatever reasons Sarah had for what she did, Radiah didn’t know or care.

On the other hand, of course, perhaps Sarah really did change personality into a malicious bongo for a few days and deliberately sabotaged Dana out of simple spite. Hard to say at the moment – but personally I’m leaning in the direction of “she had a reason for what she did”. Time will tell, though.

Just a note on the second-to-last paragraph there: lord of dance only mentioned that Sarah’s not looking good right now. She seems like the one who’s pushing everyone away for the sake of pushing them away. They never said that Sarah had to look that way in the end, or was even going to look that way. Just that she is currently looking like the ‘bad guy’.

You know, in Dumbing of Age, I expect Raidah to be some kind of horrible narcotic-pushing monster in the end because Sarah is closer to the protagonist side, but I can’t help but remember the Walkyverse Sarah and not think that maybe this Sarah has it coming as well.

I’m on Team Sarah even if she flips everyone off, grabs her crotch and farts before dropping a smoke pellet and bouncing. That is her prerogative. She doesn’t have to be friends with anyone. I’m 100% pro marijuana legalization, but it’s not legal yet, keep that shit out of your dorm. Don’t drag other people into your illegal activities.

I might be more for Sarah if she did all that. And if she then screamed, vandalized a car, and transformed into a big cat, well, I don’t know that I’d be her fan for life, but I’d give it serious consideration.

I didn’t realize that until you pointed it out.
Firstly, I forgot the background was blue and just ignored it entirely.
Secondly, I didn’t forgot the comic itself was blue, because I automatically envisioned it in full color.
Thirdly, I failed to notice that the background (as in, the ‘white’space between the panels) of the comic itself is either transparent or the same shade of blue.
I feel like this should be a “Damn you, Willis” moment.

Raidah is not that bad, she’s just one of those people who can’t live with the thought that not everyone likes them. So she has to be friends with you – even if you don’t want to be friends. And then she wonders why you are uncomfortable. (Been there, done that, I’m a lot like Sarah. Never narked anyone, but am definately a hermit)

I’ve dealt with people like that. The shitty part is when they decide they don’t care whether I — just me, out of everyone else — like them or not. They pretty much turn meaner than sin in that regard.

Reading this and the previous two srtrips, I’m getting the idea that these people rescued a crab, brought it back to health, and then were horrified and angered when one of them died and it started eating the dead carcass. It’s a crab, for god’s sake; that’s what it does.

Okay, I think the metaphor went wrong somewhere, but maybe you get my point.

To clarify: Dana and the Networkers thought they were helping the crab when they dragged it from its little crabby hole and attempted to force it to make friends with them. They brought it back to what they saw as health by trying to force it to act like themselves, then were horrified and angered when, instead of changing into one of them, surprise, it remained a crab and ate the dead body of one of their members while Zoidberg watched through a window.

Have I got all our points covered? Would “Dana and the Networkers” be a good name for a band?

A girl is inside a crusty shell. You cannot tell if she either a heinous bongo or a nice person while inside said shell. You will not know either until the crust comes off. Until that moment, all you assume is that the girl is a heinous-bongo-cum-nice-person.

I’m no longer sure if I like Sarah or Raidah. It’s obvious Raidah doesn’t know how to deal with the fact Sarah is alive and thus still hasn’t been dealt with. People who cross Raidah should be banished and not allowed to influence anybody. That whole childish “I wish you were dead” thing comes to mind.

On the other hand, Sarah is almost getting annoying with her attitude. Maybe it’s because we are seeing her a lot lately, but there is a point where people start saying, “wish granted”, and leave you alone. I joke and tease how much I dislike people, but not in introductions where I’m supposedly trying to not hate everyone. Then again, I don’t really understand most people either, so the patience displayed both amazes and dismays me.
“A man who trusts everyone is a fool and a man who trusts no one is a fool. We are all fools if we live long enough.”

I think that Sarah is a bit nervous about falling in with her stoner roommate’s crowd, and a bit reluctant to engage in the buttkiss-I-mean-networking that is the whole reason she’s having this conversation. So her nervousness leads her to be snarky, and her reluctance to schmooze inclines her to overcompensate in the other direction.

Though I’ll also note that she’s not actually being snarky or antisocial in this comic. (That was yesterday’s action.) Today she’s just frankly admitting that she’s not comfortable with this sort of social interaction, and that absent the defense of her usual snark she feels vulnerable. Her facial expression in the last panel makes this practically an apology.

shades of Daria – interesting that I never considered the similarities before. They both put up a sarcastic, off-putting shell to avoid having to worry about interacting with people – and this is pretty much canon in both.